


Jiji

by drelfina



Series: The Reckoning: Symbol of Subjugation Inspired [9]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Baby Uchiha itachi, Clownfish AU, Gen, Madara is Madara, Shisui is a tiny firebug, baby Uchiha Shisui, clownfish jutsu doesn't feature very much though, i just like that particular kind of characterisation, technically still a clownfish au, tiny baby Uchiha Itachi is the cutest, tiny baby Uchiha Shisui is... well
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-04
Updated: 2020-07-04
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:42:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25061071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drelfina/pseuds/drelfina
Summary: He'd always been precocious.Uchiha Shisui's relationship with Uchiha Madara.
Relationships: Baki/Uchiha Shisui, Uchiha Madara & Uchiha Shisui, Uchiha Shisui & Uchiha Itachi
Series: The Reckoning: Symbol of Subjugation Inspired [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1649584
Comments: 27
Kudos: 186





	Jiji

**Author's Note:**

  * For [evocates](https://archiveofourown.org/users/evocates/gifts).



> This must be read _after_ The Grand Noble Bloodline, because it won't make as much sense without it.

He'd always been precocious. 

"He's set fire to the _crib_ this time?!"

As soon as he'd figured out how to breathe on his own, and that the things on the ends of his arms were fingers, he'd been able to shape chakra, and breathe fire. 

"Where is he gone now?!" 

Once he'd figured out how to walk, there had been no going back.

* * *

"There's literally - Grandfather. Please, can you - I don't want to bother you but there's literally no one else to watch him while we put out the fire." 

Big hands catching hold of him, and then he was blinking up into the bright red and black of spinning wheels. 

"Wheels," he said, pointing, and tried to set it on fire. 

"Mmhm." 

The black spokes changed _shape_ , and colour, and suddenly fire winked out from his hands. 

"Gone?" 

Gone, no more fire. 

He pushed chakra into his hands, and blinked in surprise at the fact that for the first time, they didn't answer with flame.

A deep voice. "Look." 

And he looked up at a big hand, opening with a purple flame, uncurling like petals of a fire. 

And he laughed.

* * *

"How did you put him to sleep?" 

"How did you think I did, Rishiri-kun." 

"Grandfather, using the sharingan on a baby is a little much!" 

"Did I say I used the sharingan on him?"

* * *

"Jiji, Jiji, look!" 

Always, it was easy enough to get Jiji's attention; Jiji would turn away from anyone else when he called. Didn't matter what he wanted, Jiji would turn to him and hold his hands out to let him drop things into it. Stones, butterflies, the one time a frog that leapt up into Jiji's face and scrambled into thick white hair, and Jiji didn't stop him when he scrambled after the frog, stepping on Jiji's knees and hands and following said frog into Jiji's hair. 

This time, though, this time it wasn't a frog. 

"Look what I found!" He held it up. 

"... that's a baby," Jiji said. 

"My baby," he said, but he held it up to Jiji to examine, big grave eyes looking over it. 

"... I believe that's Mikoto's child." 

"No," he said, pulling the baby back and squishing it hard against his chest. "It's mine now! I found it." 

"I believe it's a he." 

He stuck his lip out. This was his, he'd found it wandering alone in the garden path! 

"Come, what is its name?" 

"I can name it!" 

The baby squirmed, making little noises, like tachi, tachi!! And he said, "I can name it 'tachi! Tachi-chan. My Tachi-chan." 

A laugh. "Alright that sounds right. But you have to ask if he wants to be your little brother first." 

Little brother? 

How odd. The idea of a little brother was interesting. 

Tachi-chan bopped him on the nose and he dropped Tachi-chan; fortunately it was just grass, and the baby went flomp onto its butt. 

Jiji just laughed. 

"You're my brother now," he said to the Tachi-chan. "You can't hit me if you're my brother!" 

"I believe," Jiji said, smiling, "you'll find that it's the right of little brothers to hit you all the time." 

"But that's not fair!" he exclaimed. 

"You get to do all the fun things first, isn't that fair?" Jiji said, and that was true. 

He got to make big fires first, before the Tachi-chan did, and he had learned to walk and run and climb trees and set fire to the roof tiles way before Tachi-chan could, so in that sense, it was fair. He got to have dango and sweets and toys before Tachi-chan could, and it was really only right that he shared with his Tachi-chan. 

Jiji was always right.

* * *

Going to school was fun the way that setting fire to Uncle Tora's sakura trees was fun; exciting, new, and involved a lot of screaming. 

He liked his classmates, and he liked his teachers, but most of all he liked coming back to show Jiji and Tachi-chan all the new things he'd learned, so he could teach Tachi-chan and Jiji could judge, and give out mochi as prizes. 

There were a lot of things to learn in school, and he finished most of the books really early, so Tousan and Kaasan always had more things for him to read, and eventually Jiji told him how to go to the library so he had even more things to show Tachi-chan. 

The problem with showing Tachi-chan things was that while Tachi-chan was as fast as he was, reading real quick, Tachi-chan also got real quick at learning how to smack him with sticks - and later with the practice kunai and swords that they had. 

But Jiji had said that it was the right of younger brothers to get to hit, so he didn't hit back as hard, because he was bigger, he was stronger, and therefore it was his duty to be protective and careful. 

And if Tachi-chan was fast, well he was going to have to be faster, and he would find out how to be faster than the shunshin, so that he could teach Tachi-chan that too. 

Because it was his right to do everything first, and it was his right to teach his little brother.

* * *

He had graduated from the Academy and started going on missions; little ones, short ones, but only short in that they took all day, instead of days and weeks like real grown up missions. He got real pay too, so he could buy his own things like stationery and the nice silk handkerchiefs in Uchiha colours (and others too) and better flint and better materials. 

He used to share them with Tachi-kun (-kun now, not chan, because Tachi would pout if he called him -chan) but Tachi-kun was going to the Academy now, and usually was studying when he came home after missions, and sometimes he only had time to go sit with Jiji for half an hour before he was shooed home for dinner, and less time for Tachi-kun. 

He learned a few new jutsu, and would want to share them with Tachi-kun, but Tachi-kun was preoccupied with his _new_ little brother and while the new little brother was small and red and screamed a lot, he was Tachi-kun's little brother, and not his. 

"Well, there's that little brother of his now, isn't there?" Jiji said, patting his hair. "Everyone's going to be busy with the new baby." 

As Tachi-kun's little brother, it was Sasuke-chan's right to demand Tachi-kun's time, as Jiji had said. It was Sasuke-chan's right to have Tachi-kun's attention.

And there was so much work. Tachi-kun did so much schoolwork, and with the baby, and learning things to teach the baby, even though the baby wasn't even walking, not like when he had found Tachi-chan the first time, Tachi-kun had no time for him anymore.

* * *

"I don't see you and Itachi-kun anymore hmm? What's up with that, kid?" Jiji said, handing him a fat red date.

He pouted. "He's busy training," he said. 

"That's normal." 

"Yeah," he said. "He's gonna graduate next year. That's faster than me, and he looks so tired, Sasuke-chan is so _demanding_ , if Tachi-kun is learning so much so he can teach him all that." 

"Next year?" 

He looked up at Jiji, who was now straightening up. "Yeah," he said. 

"I see." 

He tipped his head, and Jiji looked very very serious, and he knew that he'd said something important, but then Jiji looked down at him and held out the plate of dates. "Jiji?" 

"It's fine. I'll take care of Tachi-kun."

* * *

It was only two days and suddenly Tachi-kun had time for him again, eager to hear what new jutsu that he had found out, had learned. 

"I don't need to read anymore," Tachi-kun said, when he asked about his schoolwork. "I'm going to be," he said, almost conspiratorial, "A _smith_." 

"Whaaaat," he said, because a smith? Really? 

"And I'll make all the weapons," Tachi-kun said. 

"And the jewellery for every Daimyo in the world?" he asked, eyes wide because that was true, real magic right there, with fire and metal and who didn't understand that that was the true Uchiha skill? It was what the Hagane kept _begging_ to learn. 

"Every Daimyo and every noble too," Tachi-kun said, nodding seriously. 

So of course he had to drag Tachi-kun to Jiji to brag that his little brother was going to become the best smith in the _Uchiha_. No, in Konoha. No, in the _world_.

* * *

It didn't matter what Tachi-kun decided to do or become. 

Every little thing he did was beautiful and perfect, and he would take it - and Tachi-kun - to Jiji, and Jiji would hold out hands and attention like Jiji always did, and regard it all with solemn and grave seriousness. 

It was only a few years later that Tachi-kun decided he wanted to be a priest. 

It was also around then, that he realised maybe. 

He had a crush.

* * *

"Jiji," he said, biting his lip and leaning on Jiji's back and smooshing his face into Jiji's hair that smelled of sandalwood and apple. "Jijiiiiii. I think. I think. I think I like someone." 

"Do you?" Jiji leaned forward so he could sprawl more. "Should I tell Itachi-kun to ready the burial rites?" 

"Nooo, Jiji," he said. 

"Do I know him?"

"You don't know anyoooooone outside of the Clan, Jijiiii." 

"So he's not from the Clan." 

"I don't think he knows I _exist_." 

The worst part, he thought, was that he was also the Uchiha Clan Heir. Father and Mother had been starting to talk about it. His duties. And unlike Tachi-kun, who was happily going to become a priest and had no responsibilities at all, he had plenty to learn now. 

"Doesn't he? He should though, who in Konoha doesn't know little Shunshin no Shisui?" 

"I'm not little." 

But it wasn't that. It was… 

_He_ wasn't from Konoha. 

That was a problem. Everything was very, very hard. 

"You're still very little," Jiji said, sounding amused. 

"Jiji, you're the _worst_ ," he said, smacking Jiji's shoulder. 

"Oh, ow, now you're bullying old people." 

"No I'm not!" he exclaimed. "I saw Tsunade-sensei the other day, and she said you were very strong and healthy!" He tugged at Jiji's hair. "You can still do anything, like make Tachi-kun a priest!" 

He'd just said it, off-hand, because Jiji had said something once, idly about Buddhism and religion and Taichi-kun had answered and then demanded that he find Tachi-kun books on it later, but. 

Jiji was glancing at him, over his shoulder now, eyes suddenly intent and. 

It wasn't just that was it?

Tachi-kun had always said thank you to Jiji every time they met, and he hadn't quite paid attention. But. 

But. 

Tachi-kun had only started that after that time Tachi-kun suddenly wasn't graduating early anymore.

* * *

It wasn't quite right, to not tell Jiji about Baki. 

It was probably because he had gone kinda off mission-spec, when he had met up with Baki for the first time. 

It was after the accomplishment of their mission agenda, so really there had been no real PROBLEM with that, just. 

Just. 

Some things, he thought he wanted to keep secret. Just for himself. A little more. 

It was also tied up with how much he didn't want to be Clan Leader, because it was always the - the Leader, like Father was, like Grandfather had been, even though (and he'd sat down and did the maths) Grandfather had been younger than Grandmother. 

If he had had other siblings, maybe it would have been okay; they weren't like Uzushio after all, where every Prince was groomed from birth and they were always gonna be the next Prince, like Appropriate Leadership bred true, without worries for back up. The Uzumaki were horribly perfect that way, each seal picture perfect, each Prince the personification of every leadership ideal.

He on the other hand was an only child with no back-up siblings, and he. 

He. 

He didn't want to do what his grandfather had done, take a legendary shinobi to wife. That. 

That wasn't him. That wasn't what he could do. 

And it wasn't something he wanted to talk to his grandfather about, and he couldn't talk to Mother about, and he didn't know what Father would say, because it meant that it might be saying to Father, he couldn't be a Father to the next set of Uchiha kids and then what? 

When he figured it out, maybe he'd ask Jiji. Jiji knew what to say, always knew the answers - but he had to figure out just what to ask.

* * *

"I told you there was nothing to worry about," Tachi-kun said, bopping him gently on the temple, and he just huffed, kicking his feet a little, tabi almost falling off his feet. 

"I know you did, I know. I just… Jiji fixed it. " 

Jiji fixed it all. 

"Of course he had," Tachi-kun said. "You know who _he_ is." 

When he looked to Tachi-kun, Tachi-kun was looking to the mountain, the way the trees of the Forest framed the Founders Monument, and there, it was Jiji's face, on the mountain. 

"Of course I did," he said. "I always knew who he was." 

He's Jiji. 

He's _Shisui's_ Jiji. 

There had never been a need for other names. 

END.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know why, but it felt significant to not use Shisui's name for almost the entire fic - the only time anyone used his name was when Uchiha "Jiji" Madara used it once. 
> 
> And at the end. 
> 
> I dunno. Itachi is always rendered "Tachi-chan" or "Tachi-kun", and while he loves Baki and his parents and his clan, Itachi and Madara have a very special place in Shisui's heart, and they can't be replaced. 
> 
> Shisui is going to be near inconsolable when Madara finally passes away - and it's not because a great leader had passed away, or the greatest Uchiha has finally left. But it's because his _Jiji_ is gone. 
> 
> (And Shisui knows he's Jiji's favourite. And it probably takes him quite a while to put two and two together, and realised that he'd had one of Konoha's Gods' ear almost his entire young adult life, and all he had had to do was whine ONCE and Madara had stood up and Fixed It.) 
> 
> (You really don't want the Gods to Fix Shit for you.) 
> 
> I may or may not write the story of why there was _something_ for Uchiha Madara to fix - it might take a while lol.


End file.
